{Chapter 27}

Aubrey was serving breakfast that next morning when she heard a horse ride up.

“Who’s that?” Daddy asked.

Aubrey shrugged. Wade wouldn’t be home so soon, would he? She looked out of the window to see Katie riding up.

“Oh, it’s Katie” Aubrey smiled and opened the door.

“Hi, Aubrey!” Katie grinned and greeted her.

She looked a little chipper this morning.

“Hi, Katie. What brings you out here? Come on inside” Aubrey invited Katie inside.

Katie stepped inside and noticed the strangers. She looked to Aubrey.

“Katie, this is my father and my best friend. Wade surprised me by fetching them yesterday” Aubrey smiled.

She didn’t tell Katie about her issues with her father, as she already knew most of it. Katie looked at Daddy with a glower.

“Pleasure to meet you both” she said cordially.

Brooke and Daddy both nodded, then turned toward Aubrey.

“You’ll never guess what’s happened” she giggled.

“What?”

“It’s just the best thing ever!”

“Katie, tell me or I’ll be obliged to shake it out of you” Aubrey smiled.

“Toni and Erik are going to have another child!” Katie bounced up and down.

Aubrey squealed. “Are you serious? This is such good news!”

“I know! It’s amazing! I hope it’s a boy,” Katie giggled.

“Do you want to sit down? There’s plenty” Aubrey motioned to the table.

“No, thanks. I just had to come and tell you. There was quite a celebration at breakfast this morning. You should have seen Wade’s face. He looked like a dazed cow, he did” Katie said.

Aubrey smacked her playfully. “Seems like you were studying him a little too hard.”

Katie waved her statement off. “Pfft. I don’t see how you put up with the man. He’s insufferable the way he never argues with me.”

Aubrey laughed. “It’s a shame, isn’t it?”

“Indeed. Well, I’ve got to go” Katie reached for the doorknob before turning around to face the Daddy and Brooke. “Pleasure to meet you both.”

Brooke smiled and Daddy nodded. After Katie left, Aubrey sat back down.

“She seems fun” Brooke smiled.

“She’s a handful, that’s for sure. She helped me make these curtains, though” Aubrey motioned to the curtains in the windows.

“Who’s Toni and Erik?” Daddy asked.

“Wade’s boss and her husband” Aubrey answered shortly.

“Wade works for a woman?” Daddy asked.

Aubrey nodded.

Daddy snickered and took a sip of coffee.

Aubrey smirked. Daddy hadn’t met Toni. They would have to remedy that.

**********

Wade rode around the herd, looking for strays or dumb animals caught in a fence or thistle. His mind was elsewhere, though.

What if Roy convinced Aubrey to leave?

No, she wouldn’t leave, would she? She wouldn’t leave him after all they had just begun to share.

“God, please don’t do this to me. I love her so much, and I can’t lose her. She means so much to me,” He prayed aloud.

After all, Roy had been a royal pain about the marriage. Who would want to go back to that?

He needed to just trust God with what He had planned for him and Aubrey. Everything was in his capable hands, he just needed to trust.

Without trust, any relationship isn’t worth enjoying.

***********

Aubrey introduced her father to Toni McBride.

“Daddy, this is Toni. Toni, this is my father, Roy Cutshall” she smiled.

Toni reached out to give Daddy a firm, flat-palmed handshake. Daddy looked at her strangely and shook her hand.

“It’s a real pleasure, Mr. Cutshall. I’ve heard a lot about you” Toni tugged on her gloves, looking at Daddy from underneath the brim of her white Stetson.

“Oh, really? All good I hope” Daddy smiled.

Aubrey held her breath. Toni hadn’t heard anything good about Daddy.

“Fair, I suppose” Toni nodded.

Daddy looked over at Aubrey with an accusing look in his eyes. Aubrey hated that look.

“Toni, you didn’t tell me that we had visitors” Erik’s voice came.

Aubrey smiled in relief. Something about having another man around when her father had that look made her rest easier.

“Yeah, this is Aubrey’s pop. Where’s that little friend of yours?” Toni asked.

Aubrey looked around. “I think Jay took her to find that barn cat.”

“Go figure. I’ve got to get out to the herd. I’ll talk to you guys later” Toni mounted her horse and nodded to them, smiled at her husband, then rode off.

“So, Mr. Cutshall. What brings you to Texas?” Erik asked.

“Just checking up with my baby girl, that’s all” Daddy wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

“Well, she’s in good hands with Wade. I can testify to that. The man’s as responsible as they come” Erik smiled.

“I’m sure he is” Daddy said with a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

Erik’s gaze flickered to her and back to her father.

“How long will you guys be staying?” Erik asked.

“Not long” Daddy answered.

Aubrey’s heart sank. Daddy was here for something, and she didn’t know what.

Wade came riding up at that moment, and his gaze landed on Daddy. He dismounted in a cloud of dust.

“Didn’t expect to see you here, Roy” Wade wiped sweat from his forehead with his shirtsleeve.

“No, I’m sure you didn’t” Aubrey had no idea what put her father in such a foul humor, but she hoped he improved his attitude before too long.

“Did you ask her?” Wade asked, breaking heavily as if he had ridden hard on the way here.

“Ask me what?” Aubrey asked.

“Aubrey” Daddy turned to her. “Your mother and I were discussing some things.”

“Yes?” Aubrey pressed.

“Well, we decided that it would be best if you came home with me and Brooke” Daddy announced. “We’ll leave tomorrow so you’ll have time to pack and such.”

“Leave?” Aubrey looked back and forth between Wade and Daddy.

There was such a difference between the two. Wade’s expression was anxious and longing, while Daddy’s was demanding and resigned.

“I have your train ticket and Brooke will help you pack” Daddy said.

Wade looked at her, such a begging in his sapphire eyes that it made her want to fall at his feet and beg for forgiveness for whatever she had done against him.

“I haven’t said I wanted to leave yet” Aubrey told her father.

Wade’s solemn expression perked up somewhat. Then, he looked down, probably noticing the word ’yet’.

“Y-You mean you want to stay?” Daddy asked in disbelief.

“You’re acting as if I’m just sitting here idle waiting for you to tell me I can come home. It’s not so, Daddy” Aubrey protested. “Why do you want me back, anyway? Momma can’t take care of the twins? You don’t like running the store? That’s all I was ever good for, wasn’t it? A babysitter and free help?”

Daddy’s hand raised, and Aubrey flinched, prepared for what she deserved. She shouldn’t have said those things. She needed to speak respectfully to her father, even if he barely deserved it.

Looking up, she saw Wade’s hand clasped around her father’s wrist. Erik stood off to the side, ready to intervene if need be. It felt good to have someone protect her.

“Don’t you ever raise a hand to my wife again, is that clear?” Wade said, authority oozing from his deep voice.

“I’m her father” Daddy jerked his hand from Wade’s grasp.

Wade took a step further to get in her father’s face. “I don’t care who you are. You raise a hand to her again and I’ll forget my Christian raisin’ and beat you bloody.”

A look came over her father’s face, resembling rage. He left to find his horse, leaving them alone with Erik.

“Wow. Who spit in his coffee this morning?” Erik asked.

“He’d spit in his own coffee just to find something to be grumpy about” Wade scowled.

He turned to Aubrey. “You okay?”

Aubrey nodded.

Wade looked away before asking “You gonna go?”

“No” Aubrey answered quickly.

Wade looked over at her. “You’re sure?”

“There’s no telling why he wants me home, but it sure isn’t because he misses me” Aubrey looked after her retreating father. “He’s not done with you, Wade.”

She began to panic. What if he caught Wade off guard in the shadows and Wade got hurt?

“You have to be careful” Aubrey put her hand on his arm.

“I will be. Come on, let’s find Brooke and Jay so we can head home” Wade took her hand from his arm and held it.

Aubrey squeezed his hand. She couldn’t dream of leaving him.

**********

Wade took the horses and led them toward the barn, whistling while he went. He hadn’t meant to be so severe on Aubrey’s father, but the man brought out the worst in him.

That man was simply insufferable!

God, help me to control my temper with Roy.

He walked into the barn and led the horses inside.

Suddenly, a fist slammed into his jaw with such a force that it knocked him onto his back on the ground.

“You’re so big and bad, aren’t you sonny? Well get up and face me like a man” Wade looked up into the eyes of Roy Cutshall.

How could an old man pack that hard of a punch? A storekeeper at that?

Then again, Roy wasn’t a small man. Wade stood, rubbing his throbbing jaw.
“I’ve got no quarrel with you yet” he stated simply, taking up the horse’s reins again.

“You think you’re gonna talk to me like that in front of my daughter and get away with it?” Roy snickered.

“I wasn’t looking for a fight, Roy. I won’t fight you until you either hurt your daughter or threaten to again, okay?” Wade stabled Abe.

“You had no right to interfere. Aubrey has never been allowed to speak to me like that” Roy put a finger in Wade’s face.

“Now let’s just calm down, okay?” Wade pushed the finger aside. “Aubrey’s a grown woman. Frankly, I don’t blame her for a single thing she said.”

Roy punched him on the jaw, laying him out again.

What was the man’s problem?

“What’s going on in here?” Aubrey’s shrill, panicked voice said. “Daddy!”

She rushed to Wade’s side and knelt beside him. Wade sat up and swatted her hands away.

“I’m fine” he said.

Aubrey stood and turned to her father, the rage in her eyes looking out of place on her normally placid face.

“How could you?” she asked.

So? What do we think?

I personally enjoyed writing Wade getting punched... and not fighting back. I have no idea why, because most of my heros would fight back:) lol